KNUST Resumes Operations As Senior Staff, Call Off Strike
After the University’s Chapter of the Senior Staff Association called off its strike on Monday, June 14, the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) has resumed normal administrative and academic activity.
The Senior Staff had been on strike for three weeks to support the Association’s demand for better working conditions and payment of outstanding “Tier-Two” contributions from retired members.
Members wanted a higher market premium and non-basic allowances, as well as the relocation of public universities to the Control and Accountant-payroll General’s system.
“We are urging all members to come back to work since all outstanding issues are being dealt with,” Mr George Ansong, the KNUST Chapter President of the Association, told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Kumasi.
Academic activities were in full swing when the GNA visited the KNUST Basic School, as the Senior Staff had reported to duty.
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The University Hospital, Fire Department, Administration Building, and other departments and faculties on campus, which had been deserted by the striking Senior Staff, were now back in operation.
Members of the parent organization, the Senior Staff Association of the Universities of Ghana, have conducted a series of protests since February 2021 to express their dissatisfaction with what they saw as unfavorable practices within the University system that tried to marginalize them.
They criticized the current situation as unfair, claiming that members had been routinely refused certain benefits such as paid study leave and medical care for personnel and their families.
Mr Ansong hinted that a recent stakeholders’ meeting, which included the Association’s National Executive Committee, the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission, the National Labour Commission, Vice-Chancellors of the respective universities, and other related parties, prompted them to call off the strike.
“The Senior Staff has decided in principle to begin work, thus it is the responsibility of members of the Association to follow the leadership’s directives,” he stated.
Source: GNA
